Michael Mark

He asks Me Questions I Can’t Answer

My father judges Keep or Throw
from one of the two chairs I unfolded
by the front door, pillow for his back, 
towel for his tush.

He sighs over shoes, tags dangling 
from heels held out
in a house packer’s tree trunk hands.

She never wore them? Even once?

Bags of bras, a scarf he brings to his eyes, wallet 
he hunts through like a thief, yarn-wrapped
wire hangers. The men parade parts of her 
for him to touch, travel back, give his verdict. 

She loved these things, shouldn’t I love them, too?          

Finger tap, nod, shrug, wince – everything 
receives its blessing. Some he hugs 
before making the final decree, eyes tight 
in séance with her. Some he calls back 
after they’ve been carried down to the truck, Grey gloves! 
Pearl buttons! Keep! KEEP!

By 4, he’s slumping, dazed. The men barely slow, 
stacks of boxes rush by. He startles, Hey! 
Mister! Jesse Owens, Stop! Those boxes – 
they’re empty?

The man’s gone to the truck with no answer. 

Do they know I’m still here? 

He looks at the Keep pile.

Where is she? 

Michael Mark’s poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Alaska Quarterly Review, Columbia Poetry Review, Los Angeles Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Pleiades, Poetry Daily, Rattle, The Sun, Verse Daily, and The Poetry Foundation's American Life in Poetry. He’s the author of two books of stories, Toba and At the Hands of a Thief (Atheneum). Visit him at michaeljmark.com.